Its been a couple of days since Andrew’s article detailing the path we took in putting our short film The Thomas Beale Cipher online. Some folks have taken it as an attack on film festivals, and I won’t say that they’re completely wrong about that. I think festivals are aware of these arguments however, and have slowly been looking for ways to make themselves relevant in an online world. Here are a couple of news stories about those attempts.

The NYC fest recently released details of its online program for next month. Last year they sold “Virtual Passes” which allowed you to watch a pre-selection of features and shorts that were playing the fest. This year they’ve decided to go free, showcasing 6 features and 18 shorts. The catch is that you have to register for limited “online screenings” of the films, which can run out. If you manage to make it into one of these virtual screenings you then have 24 hours to watch the film. The second catch, which is sure to disappoint for many of you, is that the films will only be available to viewers in the US. Check out Tribeca’s page for more details,  and we’ll talk about this further when we get closer to the fest.

The second piece of news is that The International Short Film Festival Oberhausen in Germany has created a new searchable online archive of past films that have played the venerable fest. Here is the press release with more details. They advertise over 270 short films currently, with that catalog expanding through time. The real exciting news though is that filmmakers will control their rights, and it looks as though the framework is open for monetization. The bad news is that the site design and user-experience is abysmal. I haven’t spent much time on yet, but it is definitely the most ambitious undertaking by a film festival in this regard that I’ve yet seen Check it out.